…is paved with good intentions, the ancient proverb states.

So what are we to make of this:

Interrogators at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, forced a stubborn detainee to wear women’s underwear on his head, confronted him with snarling military working dogs and attached a leash to his chains, according to a newly released military investigation that shows the tactics were employed there months before military police used them on detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

The techniques, approved by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld for use in interrogating Mohamed Qahtani — the alleged “20th hijacker” in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks — were used at Guantanamo Bay in late 2002 as part of a special interrogation plan aimed at breaking down the silent detainee.

Military investigators who briefed the Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday on the three-month probe, called the tactics “creative” and “aggressive” but said they did not cross the line into torture.

The report’s findings are the strongest indication yet that the abusive practices seen in photographs at Abu Ghraib were not the invention of a small group of thrill-seeking military police officers. The report shows that they were used on Qahtani several months before the United States invaded Iraq.

The investigation also supports the idea that soldiers believed that placing hoods on detainees, forcing them to appear nude in front of women and sexually humiliating them were approved interrogation techniques for use on detainees.

As Pennywit states with the eloquence of brevity, “The thing, as they say, speaks for itself.”

Next, what are we to make of this:

Washington, meanwhile, is an echo chamber of Rove’s agents. His lawyer, Robert Luskin, has trashed Cooper: “By any definition, he burned Karl Rove.” RNC chairman Ken Mehlman has appeared on talk shows, given newspaper interviews and circulated a three-page memo of talking points to Republican surrogates. In one brief statement, for example, Mehlman said: “The fact is Karl Rove did not leak classified information. He did not, according to what we learned this past weekend, reveal the name of anybody. He didn’t even know the name … He tried to discourage a reporter from writing a story that was false.”

Mehlman’s farrago of lies and distortions may be a fair representation of Rove’s fears. Is it “the fact” that Rove didn’t leak classified information? Plame’s identity of course was classified. That is why the CIA referred the matter to the Department of Justice for investigation. But is Mehlman disclosing yet another Rove worry? The prosecutor can indict under any statute, including simply leaking classified information. Is Rove afraid of being indicted under that law, not just the one that makes it a crime to identify Plame? Mehlman raises a further Rove anxiety. No, Rove didn’t “reveal the name.” But the law doesn’t cite that as a felony; it only specifies revealing the “identity” as a crime. It says nothing about a “name.” Rove revealed “Joe Wilson’s wife.” That qualifies as an “identity.” By the way, Plame did not go by the name of Plame, but Wilson — in other words, Mrs. Wilson, or “Joe Wilson’s wife.” Rove seemed to know that much — her identity.

Helpfully guiding a reporter to the truth and away from “a story that was false”? Indeed, Rove was planting two false stories, not just one. The first was that “Joe Wilson’s wife” had sent him on his mission; the second was to suggest that Wilson was wrong and that there would be new information to support the original Bush falsehood. In fact, the White House admitted that Wilson was correct and that Bush’s 16 words were wrong. Yet Rove attempted to insinuate doubt in the mind of the reporter to discourage him from writing a story that was true.

At one point, on CNN, Wolf Blitzer asked Mehlman if he had attended meetings at the White House on how to deal with Wilson. Suddenly, the voluble Mehlman constricted. “I don’t recall those meetings occurring,” he said. Has the prosecutor inquired about such meetings and their participants?

The sound and fury of Rove’s defenders will soon subside. The last word, the only word that matters, will belong to the prosecutor. So far, he has said very, very little. Unlike the unprofessional, inexperienced and weak Ken Starr, he does not leak illegally to the press. But he has commented publicly on his understanding of the case. “This case,” he said, “is not about a whistle-blower. It’s about a potential retaliation against a whistle-blower.”

In light of this:

Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, came to Rove’s defense during a press briefing Tuesday by saying, “Any individual who works here at the White House has the confidence of the president. They wouldn’t be working here at the White House if they didn’t.” What is the likelihood that Bush would ever actually fire Rove, a close confidant and the architect of his re-election campaign?

I think, were Karl Rove to be indicted for any crime, it would be impossible for the president to keep him on. Short of that, I don’t think that he will go anywhere. I think the president will stand behind him.

If you look, the president’s past comments were pretty clear: that anyone who is responsible for leaking classified information, which is a crime, would be fired. Until and unless that’s proven in this case, I don’t think that Karl Rove will go anywhere.

As to the question of whether what Karl Rove did was a smear campaign, or politically sleazy, it’s pretty clear to me that everyone in White House — from the president, to the vice president, to other officials — shared Rove’s interest in discrediting former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who was critical of the administration’s case for going to war in Iraq.

Other than standing by Rove, how much longer can the White House remain silent and dodge this issue?

The president spoke out this morning to say it’s an ongoing investigation and that they should get to the bottom of it. But, beyond that, he’ll try to make it clear that Karl Rove continues to do his job as normal, that it’s business as usual, and that he retains the president’s confidence. It’s pretty clear that’s the case.

The White House has a political problem because they have made statements that are wrong and that are no longer accurate. That’s brought the heat on them.

And this:

Take my word, there has been a lot of soul searching in the so-called Main Stream Media (MSM) over its performance, or lack of performance, in the months leading up to the American-led ouster of Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq. Specifically, did we replace what should have been professional skepticism with a certain mindless credulousness in assessing the reality of the Bush administration’s claims of imminent danger to the country and the world from Saddam’s supposedly vast stash of weapons of mass destruction, including — only months away, it was said — the nuclear kind?

If we failed, was it out of a misplaced sense of patriotic duty, or political cowardice or sheer incompetence — or all three? The press corps was spring-loaded with self-doubt over the WMD issue, and ready to snap over any story that would allow it to revisit what now looks to have been a massive — and embarrassingly successful, from the press’ point of view — propaganda campaign.

So Rove was a spinner on the WMD front? After him!

George Bush’s theory of press relations is pretty straightforward: Control the message with military precision, and never waver. Authorized leaks are OK under certain circumstances, although this crowd doesn’t like them very much under any circumstances. Unauthorized leaks are punishable by instant excommunication. The Bush White House is the tightest-run ship in modern times, which means probably ever.

The deliberately colorless Ari Fleischer raised the content-free “briefing” to a dismal high art; Scott McClellan, who studied at the brogans of the Master is, if anything, even less communicative and, unlike Fleischer, who once worked on the more media friendly Hill, never betrays the slightest sense of guilt about saying nothing. So, in human terms, and, yes, reporters are humans, you can imagine the reaction when McClellan was caught in what looks pretty clearly to be a series of lies about Rove’s role in dishing dirt on Mr. and Mrs. Wilson.

Karl “not involved”? PULEASE — scenes of McClellan as piñata at 11.

The physics of unaccountable power

As in physics, every action in Washington eventually has an equal and opposite reaction. A subset of that rule: Anyone with an excess of unaccountable power eventually has to pay. Karl Rove has gathered within his hands a whole LOT of unaccountable power — by which I mean that he has several jobs and the direct ear of the president, but has never faced a confirmation hearing or, for that matter, much by way of an internal rivalry in the White House.

He is The Architect, at least according to George Bush. He talks to reporters only if and when he pleases, and under the conditions he demands. How to call him on a carpet, ANY carpet?

This is how.

And in our focus on American deaths, where is the perspective on this:

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraqi civilians and police officers died at a rate of more than 800 a month between August and May, according to figures released in June by the Interior Ministry.

In response to questions from The New York Times, the ministry said that 8,175 Iraqis were killed by insurgents in the 10 months that ended May 31. The ministry did not give detailed figures for the months before August 2004, nor did it provide a breakdown of the figures, which do not include either Iraqi soldiers or civilians killed during American military operations.

While the figures were not broken down month by month, it has been clear since the government of Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari took over after the Jan. 30 election that the insurgency is taking an increasing toll, killing Iraqi civilians and security workers at a faster rate.

In June the interior minister, Bayan Jabr, told reporters that insurgents had killed about 12,000 Iraqis since the start of the American occupation - a figure officials have emphasized is approximate - an average monthly toll of about 500.

I was taught the most fundamental Christian value is “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

Do your own math.

Death, destruction… and not solely from external sources.

We have willingly, even in some cases eagerly, walked down this path.

Are you content with the results?

Find the patterns in the white noise yourself, if you are willing to think instead of react.

Draw your own conclusions.

This ain’t no technological breakdown
Oh no, this is the road to hell

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